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Illinois Public Media

UPDATE:Police Killed By Shooter in Baton Rouge; Shooter Also Dead

Baton Rouge Police with assault rifles block Airline Highway after police were shot in Baton Rouge, La., Sunday, July 17. Authorities say multiple law enforcement officers have been killed and injured in a shooting in Baton Rouge Sunday.

Max Becherer/Associated Press

Three law enforcement officers have been killed and three others wounded in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Police say the suspect was shot and killed at the scene, but it's unclear whether he acted alone. A law enforcement official familiar with the investigation identified him as Gavin Long.

Two people described as ``persons of interest'' have been detained in a nearby town.

One Victim Identified

One of the slain officers has been publicly identified. Louisiana State Rep. Ted James Sunday gave the name of the dead officer as Montrell Jackson.

James said he knows Jackson and his family, and spoke to the family earlier in the day. He said Jackson was the father of a 4-month-old child.

Erika Green, a friend of the Montrell Jackson family confirms with the Associated Press that he had posted an emotional Facebook message just days ago about the challenges of being a police officer.

A screenshot of the image has been widely circulating on the internet. It’s dated July 8, just three days after a black man was shot and killed by police in Baton Rouge, touching off a tense week between police and the city's African-American population.

In the message, Jackson says he is physically and emotionally tired. He says while in uniform he gets nasty looks and out of uniform some consider him a threat.

Details Emerge About Shooter

Late Sunday afternoon, law enforcement officers in Kansas City, Missouri, converged on a house listed for a man with the shooter’s name, Gavin Long.

Long is believed to have briefly attended the University of Alabama. University spokesman Chris Bryant says 29-year-old Gavin Eugene Long, of Kansas City, Missouri, was a student for one semester in the spring of 2012. Bryant says university police had no interaction with Long during that time.

Police Were Investigating Report Of An Armed Man

This latest attack on police took place at a Baton Rouge gas station less than a mile from police headquarters. It comes less than two weeks after a black man was shot and killed by Baton Rouge police in a confrontation that sparked nightly protests across the city.

Radio traffic indicates Baton Rouge police were answering a report of a man with an assault rifle when they were met by gunfire _ and for several long minutes, they didn't know where the shots were coming from. The radio exchanges were made public Sunday by the website Broadcastify.

Response From Public Figures

In the wake of the shooting, President Barack Obama called on Americans to avoid ``overheated'' rhetoric and focus on unifying words following the fatal shooting of three police officers in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Obama noted that the shooting and other recent incidents in Texas and elsewhere come just before the Republican and Democratic conventions are set to begin. He says that's a time when rhetoric tends to get hotter than usual. Obama says the U.S. doesn't need ``careless accusations'' intended to score points but should instead try to ``temper our words.''

Republican Donald Trump blamed a ``lack of leadership'' for the shooting. Trump said in a statement posted on his Twitter and Facebook pages that ``We grieve for the officers killed in Baton Rouge today.'' He went on to ask, “How many law enforcement and people have to die because of a lack of leadership in our country? We demand law and order.''

Hillary Clinton condemned the attack on law enforcement in Baton Rouge. In a statement on Sunday afternoon the Democratic presidential nominee said,

``There is no justification for violence, for hate, for attacks on men and women who put their lives on the line every day in service of our families and communities.'' Clinton said that violence must be rejected to ``strengthen our communities.''

Meanwhile, the mother of the son of Alton Sterling, the African-American man killed by Baton Route Police July 5, says she is heartbroken for the officers who were gunned down and their families, and is calling for peace.

In a statement issued Sunday evening Quinyetta McMillon says she is disgusted by the despicable act of violence that resulted in the officers' deaths and that all she and her son Cameron want is peace.

Thirty-seven-year-old Sterling, was killed by white officers after a scuffle at a convenience store. The killing was captured on widely circulated cellphone video.